Claudius of Rome

Holy Martyr Claudius of Rome was one of four martyrs, Pope Marcellinus of Rome and Claudius, Quirinus and Antoninus, condemned to death in the persecution of Diocletian and Maximian (284-305), who died in the year 304. The Azbyka page tells their story together and says nothing particular about Claudius.

Marcellinus was pope of Rome at the height of the persecution, when in a single month seventeen thousand people were put to torture. Seized, he burned incense and sacrificed to idols out of fear of the torments. The emperor called him a friend and clothed him in rich garments, but Marcellinus wept bitterly, for having urged many to suffer for Christ he had himself shown his flock an example of weakness.

At Sinuessa in Campania a council of one hundred and eighty bishops and presbyters was gathered. The pope came to it in sackcloth, with ashes on his head, and asked to be judged for his denial. The fathers told him to pronounce judgment himself, since the sin had come out of his mouth, and reminded him that Peter too had denied out of fear but wept over his sin and again gained the Lord's favour. Marcellinus held himself deprived of the holy rank and asked that his body not be buried but left to the dogs.

Back in Rome, he threw at the emperor's feet the robe he had received from him and said that he repented of denying Christ. The emperor, enraged, condemned him to death. After a prayer to the Lord, who mercifully receives repentant sinners, the martyr bowed his own head beneath the sword, and with him Claudius, Quirinus and Antoninus were beheaded († 304).

The body of Marcellinus lay beside the road for thirty-⁠six days, until the apostle Peter appeared to the new pope, Marcellus, and commanded him to bury it, reminding him of the saying that he who humbles himself will be exalted. Marcellus laid it in a tomb made for martyrs by the noble Roman woman Priscilla.

Saint Claudius is commemorated on 20 June, in the new style.